Kelly pushing to comeback from winless seasons

David Berr, Beaumont Enterprise

By David Berry

Published 1:00 am, Saturday, May 31, 2014

Cade Therot, Jared Thomas, and Zackary Roberts, left to right, warm up before their exercises Thursday afternoon. Monsignor Kelly Catholic High School football players exercised Thursday afternoon as they began prep for the following fall season.
Photo taken Thursday 5/29/14
Jake Daniels/@JakeD_in_SETX
Photo: Jake Daniels

Coach Frank Middelton lays out the exercise schedule for football practice Thursday. Monsignor Kelly Catholic High School football players exercised Thursday afternoon as they began prep for the following fall season.
Photo taken Thursday 5/29/14
Jake Daniels/@JakeD_in_SETX
Photo: Jake Daniels

Coach Frank Middelton lays out the exercise schedule for football...

Simon Guillory does bench presses while Cade Therot acts as spotter during Thursday's workout. Monsignor Kelly Catholic High School football players exercised Thursday afternoon as they began prep for the following fall season.
Photo taken Thursday 5/29/14
Jake Daniels/@JakeD_in_SETX
Photo: Jake Daniels

Armando Ledet squats to go under a bar while stretching before Thursday's exercise session. Monsignor Kelly Catholic High School football players exercised Thursday afternoon as they began prep for the following fall season.
Photo taken Thursday 5/29/14
Jake Daniels/@JakeD_in_SETX
Photo: Jake Daniels

Armando Ledet squats to go under a bar while stretching before...

Armando Ledet performs bench presses while Justin Broussard spots him Thursday. Monsignor Kelly Catholic High School football players exercised Thursday afternoon as they began prep for the following fall season.
Photo taken Thursday 5/29/14
Jake Daniels/@JakeD_in_SETX
Photo: Jake Daniels

Armando Ledet performs bench presses while Justin Broussard spots...

Armando Ledet, standing, spots Justin Broussard as he does bench presses Thursday afternoon. Monsignor Kelly Catholic High School football players exercised Thursday afternoon as they began prep for the following fall season.
Photo taken Thursday 5/29/14
Jake Daniels/@JakeD_in_SETX
Photo: Jake Daniels

Armando Ledet, standing, spots Justin Broussard as he does bench...

Simon Guillory does bench presses while Cade Therot acts as spotter during Thursday's workout. Monsignor Kelly Catholic High School football players exercised Thursday afternoon as they began prep for the following fall season.
Photo taken Thursday 5/29/14
Jake Daniels/@JakeD_in_SETX
Photo: Jake Daniels

Simon Guillory does bench presses while Cade Therot acts as spotter during Thursday's workout. Monsignor Kelly Catholic High School football players exercised Thursday afternoon as they began prep for the following fall season.
Photo taken Thursday 5/29/14
Jake Daniels/@JakeD_in_SETX
Photo: Jake Daniels

As far as Al Rabb is concerned, the 2014 high school football season has started and he is not looking into the past.

The first-year head football coach at Kelly Catholic has been tasked with turning around a team that followed up a TAPPS Division I State-runner up season in 2011 with two straight winless seasons in 2012 and 2013.

Rabb, who was already an assistant at Kelly prior to getting hired as head coach, knows that the spring practice that the team conducted as well as the summer strength and conditioning is just as important to next season's success as anything else they will do.

"Summertime is just as important as the rest of the year," Rabb said. "In fact, in some ways it's more important because it leads right into August with the hot sun. As many of them as we can get here working and doing the things we need to do, the better off we'll be in August."

Kelly Catholic students finished up classes for the 2013-14 year on May 23 and the football team jumped right into summer workouts the next week. Throughout the summer, the Bulldogs will workout Monday through Thursday, overseen by assistant coach Frank Middleton and Rabb.

When asked about what his players could most improve on over the summer, Rabb said just about everything.

"I don't think you can separate the two," Rabb said of the strength and conditioning. "The bigger the better, the faster the better. We're headed in the right direction on all those accounts."

The numbers for the first week of workouts were in the low teens, with more players expected to show up as the summer goes along. Rabb is depending on the players that showed up from day one to advertise to other players to come to workouts.

Since Rabb has experienced the good and bad at Kelly, he does not plan on looking at the last two seasons. In fact, the uniforms from last season, which featured Vegas gold helmets, royal blue and Vegas gold uniforms, will be ditched in favor of the more traditional old gold and royal blue. There will be one royal blue helmet, two jerseys and three sets of pants, allowing for six combinations of uniforms.

"We have not mentioned anything of the past since the end of (last) football season," Rabb said. "Don't plan on mentioning it. We have one target date right now and that's August 29."